This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
I ended up with a K fare outbound and a Z inbound, and not having familiarised myself with V-Flyer prior to booking I didn't think much about the conditions attached nor how they'd haunt me.
I'd tried six times to blag an upgrade from the K, to no avail and I suppose rightly so because if they "made an exception" it becomes a precedent and the whole condition of K not being upgradeable using miles would be invalidated.
So, with me finally having accepted I'd be in PE, here goes....
Check-in, no issues. Quick, pleasant, job done. Security at LHR is a breeze although I managed to trigger an alarm through the scanner which resulted in a shoes-off meeting with that body scanner thing , so I suppose that means some security personnel has seen the outline of my genitals. Lucky them, that's all I can say. Strangely the scan flagged up warnings on both my wrists, which even the staff were confused at.
I took advantage of the No. 1 lounge via Priority Pass to waste the hour and a half I had spare, obviously it's no Clubhouse but it has a hot and cold food selection, a bar, and a spa that you can pay for. Relatively uneventful stay there, aside from me seeing the tail of a BA plane glide into view from the window outside, when I took a closer look it was the same A320 that had brought me into LHR from Gibraltar yesterday, and yes I am sad enough to have recognised the registration number!
So, with a departure time of 0915 and my watch saying 0825 I headed off to the gate. There was a queue down the corridor of gate 22, with no suggestion that economy and others would be split off at some point. This might be a good idea, as I think those "in the know" we're getting tuts and typically British "don't they know there's a queue" stares from everyone else.
However it wasn't a hardship, although as much as I do get excited about flying, the whole "I wish I was in UC" thing clearly stood out as I was the last person to take their seat in the PE cabin, everyone else probably savouring the occasion more than I.
It wasn't long before the complimentary pre-flight drinks were served, I noted it was referred to as sparkling wine rather than champagne but I'm no wine snob and it tasted fine to me, especially as I'd already had two glasses of pinio grigio in the lounge.
The PE cabin was in the capable hands of two fantastic crew. I'm sure I've read on here before that you're not allowed to mention names, but quite honestly I think I'd have asked one of them out to dinner tonight. Bit of a weakness for red hair.....
Food on board was perfectly edible. The choice of mains was shepherd's pie, veg curry, or gnocchi. The minor gripe was that the starter had a small bottle of dressing that came in a glass container. Plastic squeezable ones would be way better! Then again, if any woman has the wrist actions necessary to get the dressing out of that bottle, I think I'd be asking her out to dinner too.
The later snack was a wrap, either chicken and bacon, or two types of cheese. Both had spicy mayo with them. I asked for cheese and got chicken. No biggie. I noted that in those midget-friendly bags of crisps that the crisps themselves were actually really small, rather then being broken bits of larger ones. Do they grow especially small potatoes just for airlines? I need to know.
Another minor gripe. I'd knocked back a fair amount of booze even after the first meal. My count was 2 glasses of wine, one sparkling wine, one red wine with the meal, a gin and tonic before, and two glasses of that cream liqueur after. I was nodding off so performed that terrible flying faux pax of reclining my seat on a daytime flight. Cue me getting flailing arms from the woman behind claiming I was "pinning her into her seat". Now I made some half-baked attempt to put my seat back up by 0.05mm to shut her up, but I did notice when I later went to the toilet that she made Jimmy Krankie look like a professional wrestler and that she wouldn't have reached the back of my seat even if she'd been wearing stilts.
Entertainment wise I got a bit confused that the damned thing wasn't touch screen nor did the control panel seem to respond easily at all. Choice was good, I watched American Sniper and was saddened to learn that in real life he has died because otherwise I'd have hired him to do a number on the moany cow behind me.
We arrived at JFK pretty much on time but then suffered a delay in disembarking as one airbridge didn't work, so then we'd all have to use just one, but then the second one didn't work but they'd fixed the first one.
What I will say is that the whole immigration process has become so much more bearable! I was on a return ESTA so got to use the self-service machines. Thank god they accept British passports and I was through in less than 10 minutes.
So, that's my experience of the A340-600. Whether I'll ever get another one I'm not sure, my remaining booked flights this year are on an LGW 747 and the 789. I did note that the aisle width in UC was very limited! We had to walk through to disembark and I did think that if you were quite tall you'd constantly get nudged as people went past.
Now going to enjoy some Michelin starred dining, two football matches (proper, not that American rugby-for-wimps version), and some eye-opening times in casinos before I jet back on VS44. Thanks for reading!
( or rather what not to pack lol 
